Save Me from Myself
by musicli
Summary: Lin struggles but her mother helps her.


**Lin's Attempt**

By ~musicequalsli

Toph walked by her daughter's room and paused as she listened carefully outside Lin's door and felt the pain flood off her daughter. She could hear the heavy sobs and tears that escaped her pained daughter. She knew her daughter had been acting different and she wanted so badly to go in and hold her, but she had tried in the past to comfort her but was only earth bended away. Toph knew that her daughter held a lot of pressure on herself and held a lot of pain from her difficult life. Lin worried Toph. The daughter she knew at home wasn't there.

Toph stood silently by her daughter's door and felt Lin pick up the knife that Sokka had made her a few years back. She "saw" how Lin played with it in her hands and how Lin let is glide against her skin, sure that it was leaving cuts. Toph's heart started pounding in her chest as she heard Lin's sobs grow intensely and felt Lin's heart beat become erratic. Toph knew something bad was going through her daughter's head and just then she "saw" Lin hold the knife out and then went to stab herself.

Toph flung the door open and metal bended the knife out of her daughter's hands and onto the floor. She ran over and held her daughter in her arms and now felt the extent of how much Lin had actually cut herself and how much of a mess her daughter was in. Tears soaked through Toph's shirt as she pressed her daughter against her. Lin was shaking and sobbing in her mother's arms and soon, tears started to flow down from Toph's eyes as she rubbed her daughter's back.

They stayed like that for what seemed like hours before Lin stopped shaking and pulled away from her mom to lie on her bed, face down in her pillow. Toph continued to rub her daughter's back and ran her fingers through her hair. "Linny, what's wrong?" Toph asked cautiously.

Lin just ignored her and curled into a ball. "Lin, come on" Toph smiled at her softly "You can tell me anything"

"No! Go away!" Lin started to sob again as she tried to earth bend the floor beneath her mother to push her away.

Toph intercepted her daughter's move by sitting down on the end of the bed "I'm not going anywhere, Lin. Now talk to me"

Lin sat up and sighed "I can't take all this… It's too much, Mom…"

Toph stroked Lin's right cheek and then stopped at her bandages. "What can't you take?"

Lin cries slightly "Everything…"

"Does this have to do with what happened while you were on the job the other day?" Toph knew that as a teenager, Lin was concerned about her appearance and having 2 large cuts down her face were definitely something to be upset about, but she never thought someone could be this upset from it.

Lin shakes her head slowly but stops "Slightly… but that's not the reason, that's just a small factor…"

Toph looked at her daughter wondering what she could be that upset about. "Well, what is it?"

Lin looked at her mother's concerned milky green eyes and sighs. "Tenzin…" Lin chokes out before crying again.

Toph put her arms around her daughter and held her tight. "You guys broke up?"

Lin nods "He said he loved me… and I… I believed him… I gave him every part of me…" Lin sobs into her mother's shirt again.

"I'm so sorry Lin..." Toph ran her fingers through her daughter's hair.

"I'm such a failure! I can't metal bend! I'm one of the worst officers in Republic City! I'm unlovable! I'm such an excuse for your child… I don't belong here on earth…" Lin pushed herself away from her mother and stood up and searched around for the knife.

Toph stood up and grabbed her daughter's shoulders "Lin, look at me. Look at my eyes." Lin didn't see the point, her mother couldn't see, but looked up with watery eyes to find a pair of milky green eyes with tears built up in them.

"You are not a failure! You are far from that! You are still learning metal bending, you are a beginner, it takes time Lin, and you are still the best metal bender I know. You are the youngest officer out there and you are new to it, almost everyone has a battle scar, it's our proof of our hard work. As for being unlovable, TENZIN IS AN IDIOT TO HAVE LET SOMETHING SO GREAT SLIP AWAY. HE DOES NOT DESERVE YOU." Toph pulled her daughter into a bear hug "and you are no excuse for my child. You need to stop acting like you need to prove something to me, or the world, you are a kick-ass daughter and I wouldn't want you any different." Toph held her daughter tighter "You have been through a lot Lin, we both have, but we have each other, do not forget that, and unlike everyone else, we are family, and family sticks together. Now please Lin, promise me you will never try that again… I love you so much… if you were to leave, be well prepared for me coming after you!"

Lin nodded and held onto her mother tighter.

"Good. Now, excuse me." Toph pulls away and starts walking to the door as she mental bent the knife into her hand "I have an ass to kick but while I am gone, I expect you to bandage your cuts up, we don't want them getting infected now do we." Toph grinned back at her daughter before leaving and knocking on their next door neighbor's door and asking him to watch Lin while she was gone. She knew having a visit from her Uncle could put a small smile on her face.


End file.
